A Kentucky family farm in the United States made headlines this week when they said no to a huge offer from a major tech company that wanted to build an AI data center on their land. The Huddleston family, led by 82-year-old Ida Huddleston and her daughter Delsia Bare, own 1,200 acres of farmland that has been in their family for many generations.

In April 2025, an unnamed Fortune 100 company offered the family roughly $60,000 per acre—about 10 times what farmland normally costs. This added up to around $26 million for about 900 acres of their property. Most people would take such an offer, but the Huddleston family decided their ancestral farmland was more valuable than the money.

The family's decision reflects a growing concern about AI and water usage. The proposed data center would need enormous amounts of water to run the computer servers that power artificial intelligence. Some estimates suggest it could use up to 6 million gallons of water daily—water that farmers depend on for their crops and livestock. The family worried that using so much water for AI technology could hurt food and water security for their region.

Even though the Huddleston family refused to sell, the tech company has been buying land from their neighbors. The company filed a request to change the zoning rules for 28 different properties covering more than 2,000 acres total. Local government officials in Maysville, Kentucky will hold hearings to decide whether to allow this industrial development on farming land. The family says they will continue to resist the project, no matter what offers come their way.